


Semper Fi

by Mals86



Series: Fight or Flight Series [2]
Category: Warrior (2011)
Genre: Brotherhood, F/M, Gen, Military
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-06
Updated: 2015-11-18
Packaged: 2018-04-13 05:48:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,474
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4510167
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mals86/pseuds/Mals86
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After finishing high school in Tacoma, Tommy joins the Marines. He finds his niche, and he finds a family to replace the one he lost when he left Pittsburgh.</p><p>This will be a series of one-shots or vignettes covering the 10 to 11 years Tommy was in the USMC; they may not be in chronological order. This is mostly a Manny-Tommy bromance, with a side of Tommy-USMC bromance, and a look at the experiences that went into making Tommy the bitter guy seeking redemption (however subconsciously it may have been) in the film. Enjoy. :)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Things I Can't Have

**December 2003, Fallujah, Iraq**

LCpl. Manuel Fernandez stretched and flung himself onto his rack. A wind whirled past their tent and swirled the ever-present Iraqi dust around, blowing it onto Marines and gear alike. Right on cue, Cpl. Williams and Sgt. Hom came out with their signature curses – Williams with, “Jesus titty-fuckin’ _Christ,_ this is a goddamn motherfuckin’ mess,” muttered with disgust under his breath, and Hom with, “Monkey fudge sugar apple!” at top volume. And even though Manny was sick of the dust too, knowing what Williams and Hom were going to say before they said it made him smile, a little.

Just a little. Being here was hard enough without the dust blowing in all over everything and the nasty food and the way that everything in and around Fallujah smelled like shit: donkey shit, dog shit, goat shit, and people shit. All the time, 24/7. Not to mention the constant threat of IEDs, vehicular or mined, and the damn rockets that came out of fucking nowhere when you least expected it. You couldn’t drink enough water, not even in winter; you stayed dehydrated. Your feet sweated in your boots so bad that your toes would be wrinkled when you took the boots off. Your cammies stayed sweaty and gross all the time and forget showering; there wasn’t enough water for that purpose. Or enough time. Manny couldn’t remember the last time he was clean.

Worst of all, he was away from home. Not the seven hundred miles from San Diego to El Paso, but seven thousand miles and an entire world away. He missed his mother’s cooking. He missed his sisters’ teasing and his father’s proud hand on his back. And he missed his Pilar so bad, so damn bad… she wrote lots of letters, but it wasn’t the same as being with her, especially now. He thought of her most recent news, about the results of her ultrasound, and sighed. Happiness and love mixed up with loneliness, that was life.

He looked over at his best friend. Tommy, cleaning his weapon for the millionth time, looked up and rolled his eyes at Manny, and his mouth quirked in a resigned smile. “How many times you gotta clean that piece, Conlon?” Manny asked him, teasing. “It might as well be your girlfriend, ‘mano, way you got your hands on it alla time.”

There was a chorus of “burn” _ooooohs_ from the rest of the guys, and Tommy shook his head and rolled his eyes again. “How many? At least one more time, man.” He blew a little dust off the M16A4 and ran his hand down the barrel.

Adams razzed him some more. “You stroking that barrel like it was your dick, Conlon.”

“Oh, shut the fuck up,” Tommy said lightly. “This gal saves my life every day.”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” Williams said. “That’s bullshit, Conlon, _I_ save your life every day. Tellin’ you what to do and how to do it right.” He reached his big brown hand over and jabbed Tommy in the ribs, making Tommy yelp, and everybody laughed. After a hellish day like this one, the smallest things were funny. Anything for the release of tension.

PFC Petzold said, “How about some music, guys? Sergeant, can we patch my iPod through the speakers?”

Hom ran a hand over the black fuzz on his head. “Yeah, okay, but let me do it. I don’t want them screwed up.”

“I can do it, Sergeant,” Williams offered. “Did it last time. You didn’t even squeak about it.” Hom agreed with obvious reluctance, but he came over to supervise anyway.

Manny and Tommy shared an amused glance. Hom, who’d been ROTC in college and was still one of those geeky engineer types, was enormously picky about equipment and would routinely remind them what not to do to it in great detail. When they’d been in predeployment training and living in a two-story barracks building in the Arizona desert, Hom had once told Manny very sternly not to let his laptop fall out the window, because it was a nice one and Hom had gotten it at Costco on a great discount.

The laptop had been sitting closed on the floor _underneath_ the window.

Manny had bitten the inside of his lip to keep from laughing and acknowledged the order smartly, but he and Tommy had been in the head later, brushing their teeth and making fun of Hom. “Don’t let it fall out the window,” Manny quoted.

“Don’t dump your drink on it,” Tommy added.

“Yeah, and keep food away from it at all times,” Manny went on.

“Don’t drop it.”

“Don’t step on it.”

“Don’t get it dusty.” At that point Petzold had come in with a towel over his shoulder and heard them snickering about Hom’s bizarre warnings that no reasonable person would ever need. Petzold had chimed in with Hom’s favorite warning, “Just don’t _break_ it,” and they’d all nearly pissed themselves with laughing too hard.

Manny whispered to Tommy now, “Don’t break it,” and they laughed silently, keeping their faces away from Hom, who might be obsessive about his electronic shit and couldn’t swear to save his mother’s life, but he was a decent guy and a good Marine. If the platoon had to deal with an OCD sergeant, at least Hom’s OCD tendencies were focused on safety. That was a good thing.

They watched Williams and Hom and Petzold hooking the iPod up, and Manny thought how cool it was that the Corps could make family out of so many different people. All three people with their heads together over the speakers had black hair and dark brown eyes, Manny’s own coloring – but Williams was black, Hom Chinese, and Petzold some variety of European.

“Okay, that’s got it,” Williams said. Tommy rolled his eyes again, and Manny could read that he was thinking the same thing as Manny: that if Hom had kept his picky engineer nose out of it, it would’ve been done sooner.

“Springsteen,” Petzold said with satisfaction, and the speakers began to blare with “Rosalita.”

“Turn it down some,” Hom told him. “Don’t blow the voice coils.” Petzold looked up, opened his mouth, and shut it. Manny and Tommy tried not to look at each other, and failed. “And I need some sleep, so can you pick some quieter stuff?” Petzold just nodded and fiddled with his iPod.

Under cover of “4th of July, Asbury Park,” Tommy leaned a little ways toward Manny and said, “So. What was in your mail that made you grin all stupid, huh? You ain’t quit since chow.” Manny had wanted to hug the secret knowledge of his son close to his heart for a little while, but now that felt selfish. Good news was for sharing. “Your wife have that ultrasound yet?” Tommy asked, and the grin bloomed fresh on Manny’s face. He couldn’t help it.

“It’s a boy,” he said quietly, through the grin.

Tommy’s face went soft. “That’s awesome, man,” he said just as quietly. “Manny Junior.” He leaned further over and chucked Manny on the shoulder. “Pilar’s happy?”

“Yeah, she’s thrilled. Says it’s great to not keep callin’ the baby ‘it.’” She’d said some other stuff too, sweet stuff too private to share even with Tommy. “Both healthy, so far as the doctor can tell. _Qué bendición, gracias a Dios,_ ” he added, and crossed himself. If all went well, they’d be home shortly before the baby was born.

The music changed to “Jungleland.” Tommy nodded at him, still smiling, and turned his face away, but not before Manny had seen a flash of some emotion that was not happiness on it. Sadness? Envy? Maybe both. Tommy finally put his rifle down on the floor by his rack and covered it with a ratty piece of old towel. When he turned back to Manny, his smile didn’t match the look in his eyes.

There was some kind of inner cell inside his best friend, something like a bank vault that Tommy kept locked up tight. Nobody got in there, nobody. Tommy could joke around with you, share chow and ammo and the worst kind of shitty day. He was generous with his time and he was solidly loyal. He’d do anything to help you. He was a squared-away Marine, conscientious, a great guy. But there was that bank vault. It said I HAVE SECRETS. It said KEEP OUT.

Manny could see the shape of that bank vault pretty easy. Didn’t know what was inside it, no, but he was pretty sure that it had something to do with the tender heart his buddy kept hidden most of the time.

The measure of a man, Manny’s abuelo had always told him, was not what a man could do, but what he held firm to. “ _Tu fe, tu familia, y tu país,_ ” Abuelo had said. Your faith, your family, your country. And that had fit so well with the Marine Corps core values of Honor, Courage, Commitment, that Manny had always known he was meant to be a Marine.

He let himself drift for a second, imagining his baby son… yeah, they could name him Manny Junior, why not?... growing up to be that kind of man, too. Strong. Straight as an arrow. True. He sent up a quick prayer that it would be so.

The speakers played “Thunder Road,” and Petzold turned the volume down a little farther. This was not Manny’s kind of music – he liked salsa and urban rap, and sometimes traditional mariachi if he was in a nostalgic mood. Classic rock was not really his sort of thing. The sax was good, though, and he didn’t hate it, so he didn’t complain. Most of the guys were stretched out on their racks now. Hom was asleep, making a small buzzing noise not quite a snore, and next to him, Lilley was definitely snoring. It had been a damn long day, and if Manny let himself remember it he’d be awake for hours, feeling endless stairs under his feet as he and the guys cleared building after building, always sure to cover all the angles.

Tommy put his arms up over his head and sighed. “Damn, Manny, you’re gonna be a dad,” Tommy said to him, low-voiced and awed. “You and Pilar gonna have a little boy.”

“That ain’t new.” But Tommy was right, too. It wasn’t just “a baby” now, it was “my son.” He’d like to have a little girl too someday, and he’d have probably been over the moon if this one had been a girl. But it was a boy. Family name continued. Family values passed on. A kid he could teach stuff to. It mattered. “But yeah, I know what you mean. It’s like… shit just got real. It’s a real person in there. Feels like I can almost see him now.”

“Ain’t that somethin’.” Tommy sounded wistful.

“You ever think about it?” Manny asked him.

“Having kids someday?” On Manny’s other side, Johnson spoke up. “Oh yeah, lots of kids. But someday. After I get done bangin’ all y’all’s bitches blind with my BBC.” There was more razzing from everybody still awake, and Johnson backed off a little. “Okay, maybe not yours, Fernandez. Respect for all the baby mamas.”

Williams poked back from the other side of the tent. “Your BBC my _ass,_ Johnson. You got a _little_ BC, dude.”

“Fuck you, dawg! I do not. Eight inches, that’s the stone truth.”

The iPod played “I’m on Fire.” Adams said that he couldn’t imagine having a kid, and Chuy Nunoz said that he might have a kid in East LA, but he was for damn sure not going back to find out. Pretty standard Marine conversation. Vulgar. Not edifying. But fun, Manny thought.

“What about you, Conlon?” Williams teased. “You ever knock up a honey with that BWC of yours?”

“Oh, fuck off!” Johnson snapped back, standing up and pointing a finger at Williams in mock anger. “How is his bigger than mine, huh? You ever see it? And he’s _Irish._ They got that little-dick curse thing.”

“Come on, man, Conlon is legendary with the ladies,” Williams said. “Chick magnet for endless nonstop fuckin’ _days_. They be throwin’ it at him. No, I ain’t seen his, but the girls in the clubs all know him, they all wanna go out with him, whaddaya think?”

“Lay off, guys,” Tommy said, but he was laughing.

“Serious question,” Williams said. “You ever knock anybody up?”

“No,” Tommy said. He was still laughing a little bit, but there was this tone in his voice that sounded off to Manny. “C’mon, lay off.”

The iPod played “Secret Garden,” that wistful song from the Jerry Maguire movie soundtrack. “Tell it, Chick Magnet,” Williams said. To the rest of the group he said, “If you ain’t been clubbin’ with this guy, you should. He be havin’ to beat the pussy off with a stick, and you might catch the overspill.”

That much was true, Manny thought. Girls liked Tommy; they always had. It might be the handsome face, it might be the muscular body in the uniform, it might be the confidence in the walk. Could be all of those things. But Manny thought that a lot of girls could see the existence of that bank vault inside Tommy, too. Girls had a hard time resisting a mystery – especially if the mystery looked like it might be good in bed.

Tommy was trying to turn the topic of conversation away from how easy it was for him to get girls. “No, never got a girl pregnant,” he said, and his voice was still full of that weird regretful thing before he cleared his throat and spoke again. “Had a scare once, but it turned out to be a false alarm. These days, they oughta give me stock in Trojan, as many raincoats as I go through.”

“I _hate_ those things, dude,” Nunoz said. “Weenie beanies.”

Manny laughed. Tommy shrugged. “Cock sock,” somebody else offered, and “Bulletproof vest.”

“Safety belt,” Tommy said. “You gonna ride the ride, better strap up first.”

“That’s for damn sure,” Williams said.

Pilar used the rhythm method, which was just fine with Manny. They were married, they could have kids if they wanted. Good to space the babies out maybe, but he did really love the feeling of nothing between him and his sweet girl. Nothing between their bodies, nothing keeping their hearts apart. _Love you, mami,_ he said silently to her in his head. _Do you know I’m thinking about you? Do you know how much I miss you?_

The iPod played “Meeting Across the River,” and the condom talk subsided. Johnson finally wound down with his little who’s-made-a-baby thing and shut up. Williams doused the one bedside light, and it was finally quiet, except for Clarence Clemons’ saxophone crying into the desert night. It made a lump come up in Manny’s throat, it was such a lonely sound.

“Petzold?” Tommy said. “How come we’re still listening to all the sad Springsteen shit, huh? Shouldn’t we be about done with it?”

“It’s the _Boss,_ ” Petzold said reverently, shocked that not everybody shared his taste in music.

“What, it makes you homesick for that fuckin’ rathole New Jersey?” Nobody did deadpan sarcasm like Tommy Conlon.

There was a little pause. When Petzold spoke, he sounded sad too, younger than his nineteen years. “What’s out there… you know… it makes Jersey look like a fucking paradise. So fucking _what,_ I miss home.” Then he rallied with his usual bravado. “‘Sides, Sergeant said I could.”

“Yeah, well, now it’s time to sleep, dude, _Jesus,_ turn it off,” Tommy said, and flopped onto his side, facing in Manny’s direction.

“One more song in the playlist,” Petzold said, and the even-lonelier harmonica opening of “The River” poured out of the speakers.

“Fuck,” Tommy said under his breath. “Haven’t we had enough of this I-got-a-girl-pregnant shit tonight?”

Petzold said, “Suck it, Conlon, this is the last one.”

“Jesus titty-fuckin’ Christ,” Williams said, and sighed hard enough to raise dust. “Look, Petz, soon as it’s over, man, you either turn it off or slip in your earbuds. Now everybody _shut up._ ” This was the kind of thing that Sgt. Hom should have done, but he was dead to the world now, his mouth open and his square Chiclet teeth on display.

“What up, dude?” Manny whispered to Tommy. “This in’t my kinda music either, ‘mano, but you seem a little, you know, pissed off about it.”

Tommy didn’t answer for a minute. Manny could only see the shine of his eyes in the dim light. The piano played sad chords and Bruce sang about being brought up to do like his daddy done, and going down to the river to make out with his girl. It felt familiar to Manny. He remembered his own high school days, making out with Pilar anywhere they could get a little privacy. Then Bruce sang about, yes, getting his girl pregnant and settling for a union job and a shotgun marriage, and the slow death of hope, and Manny’s throat ached for reasons he couldn’t have explained.

“I fucking hate sad Bruce fucking Springsteen fucking sad songs,” Tommy whispered back, his voice rasping across the 18 inches between his rack and Manny’s. “They – aw shit. They make me… want things I can’t have. Things I can’t even fucking put a _name_ to.” He sounded furious.

Manny’s throat closed up even more. Bruce sang about dreams that don’t come true being lies, and Tommy sucked in an audible breath across the narrow space between their cots, and Manny blinked tears. He let the tears fall silently – for his mama and his Pilar, at home worried about him. For Tommy, this brother from another mother, with aches he couldn’t identify. For Manny’s unborn son, that he might escape hopelessness. For the guys in his platoon, all of them stressed past belief and constantly on edge, physically worn down. For the poor people of Fallujah, whose city was daily being torn down around them, and who were all living hand to mouth in hopelessness and fear.

He reached a hand over and touched Tommy’s shoulder. And then he prayed. In Spanish, because when he was emotional things just came out in Spanish. He prayed to San José, patron saint of fathers, for strength and guidance and easing of burdens, and he finished up with the Pater Noster because that seemed to be the rightful closing, and it was then that he noticed Tommy’s hand on his, gripping hard.

“Good night, brother,” Tommy said, and he sounded more at peace.

“ _Hermano,_ ” Manny said, and patted the shoulder once before sinking into his rack and falling softly into sleep.


	2. Update, Notice, and Apology

I wanted to explain that I would be removing most of my multi-chapter fics from this site and from Fanfiction net. The reason is that one of my bestest writer-buddies, Wynter S. Komen, just found out that someone had STOLEN her story, "In the Land of Gods and Monsters," from Fanfiction, changed some details, and published it as a Kindle ebook. For sale. For _money_. In fact, not one but two different people (or the same person with two different pen names) stole her story and published it, and profited from someone else's work.

And while I am beyond grateful to both Fanfiction and Archive of Our Own for providing a platform and an outlet for those of us who love stories to share them, free, out of our hearts, I'm no longer willing to risk having stories stolen and sold. I will be leaving my profile here, as well as my two short fics and the first chapters of my longer fics, but everything else will be removed.

I'm sorry.

I'm hurt, too. I am proud of these stories I've posted here, and sad that they're going to be tucked away and not read anymore. I know that if you've come here to read this story, you're disappointed too. I am still enormously glad that I've met so many terrific readers and writers through the fanfiction sites, and I am thankful every day for the opportunity I had to share stories.

I will not be posting any new stories or resurrecting the ones I've removed. I feel that this chapter of my writing life has closed – and we all know that feeling, don't we? Where you're satisfied by the happily-ever-after part but sad that it's finally arrived. I will be pursuing publication of my original fiction at this point.

I want to wish you all continued happy reading on this site. If you'd like to contact me, please do – I will be reachable at wynn AT wynnguthrie DOT com (sorry about the bot-defeating strategy there).


End file.
